One thing I’ve noticed is that my CPU runs significantly hotter than my GPU (about 20-30c hotter), but it also has significantly less airflow than the GPU heat sink. I was thinking of rebalancing the airflow to give more preference towards the CPU heatsink by partially blocking the GPU vent cover. My fans often run at full blast, but because of the CPU not the GPU, and I’m hoping to net an overall noise reduction by not sending too much air to GPU and too little to the CPU.
One of the suggestions in the thermal repasting thread was to do just this.
Tape over the inner 2 openings on the GPU vents to force more air through the CPU fins. There’s a slight noise reduction too sometimes, depending on how sensitive you are to the frequency
The 2nd gen dGPU apparently has redesigned fans and adjustments for lower noise and better airflow. But since they are not available yet we’ll have to wait and see if they are indeed better.
It looks like I get about +200mhz playing BF6 with the tape mod.
I’ve blocked off all but 2 of the fin ports on the GPU and somehow the GPU is still maintaining the same performance.
Update: settled on 3 fins just to be a little less extreme, though I also tested fully blocking a vent and having only 1 fin slot open on the other side and… it still worked, amazingly. At least for the short time I was watching temps and clock speeds in BF6. I didn’t have any black tape or vinyl, so I used orange duct tape.
By chance, is anyone aware of a 3D printable vent-blocker that would slide back and forth to allow adjustments?
Edit: I went and made my first 3D model so I could print something to block the vents. Here it is. I’v never designed a 3D model before, so sorry for the oddities.
Got 20 of these printed out, they seem to fit perfectly!
One downside I noticed after I put them in though is that placing the laptop in a bag or on its backside will put the pressure on the heatsink fins rather than the chassis.
On the plus side, the fin plugs can be easily configured for different balancing needs, and the PETG should be able to easily handle the heat just fine.
I may do a v2 that moves the laying pressure back to the chassis.
I was having significant stuttering issues in Battlefield 6 as a result of CPU performance/stuttering. About once a second my screen would freeze for a microsecond. Terribly jarring, but really had to pin-down. Turns out, it was related to my CPU temperature being too high (100c). I put 5 of these plugs into each side (blocking half the dGPU airflow ports) and my CPU stuttering disappeared!
I haven’t needed to use them for a while, so I had forgotten about them and why I made them lol.
I’ve observed the exact same behavior regarding temperatures; my CPU is consistently hitting between 95°C and 100°C under load.
Drawing from my experience with an XMG Core 16—which used the same Ryzen CPU and ran at similar thermal levels—I initially assumed these temps were just ‘business as usual’ for this architecture. However, I’m starting to realize that the Framework 16’s power distribution and thermal management might be more sensitive at these limits, leading to the instability and stutters I’ve been seeing. It definitely feels like the thermal headroom is tighter here compared to my previous machine.
I’m going to take a much deeper look into blocking the GPU fans. Thanks a lot for the help! It’s very much appreciated.
